Too hot for the beach? Here’s two places you can cool off and watch some great animation on the big screen. I’m excited to have the chance to see my film House Bunny as part of both festivals:
In the crook of Cape Cod between July 31st and August 7th, this is a fun eclectic festival. There’s a full animation program happening on Thursday August 5th at 9:00 at the Old Woods Hole Fire Station. Included in the line-up is Bill Plympton’s “The Cow Who Wanted to be a Hamburger” and some other interesting looking shorts.
Some call it punk rock, some call it grass roots, but labels aside – NYC based Animation Block Party is dedicated to exhibiting the world’s best independent, professional and student animation. This is one of my favorite US. Animation festivals and runs 30-August 1, 2010 in Brooklyn, NY at Rooftop Films and Bam Cinematek. House Bunny is part of the experimental film line up at the Bam Cinematek on July 31st ( 2pm and 6:50 pm )
The less hectic pace of summer has allowed me to spend some time ruminating on longer range goals regarding art-making. One of these is connecting and building community. This includes artists who inspire me, people who enjoy work I’ve produced and people who continue to support my work. The other item which is connected to this; for an artist wishing to produce work on a full-time basis is it possible to generate a living wage? In the next few weeks I’m going to share some of the resources I’ve discovered on this subject.
Fans, Friends And Followers:Building An Audience And A Creative Career In The Digital Age byScott Kirsner provides a good range of business models for visual artists, film makers and performers. The bulk of this book is a series of interviews where artists discuss how they developed strategies for building a fan base and creative career . Many address the issue of using multiple income streams to fund one’s work; licencing, sales of work, speaking engagements, crowd funding are some of the possibilities explored here. The book presents a nice mix of Internet and off-line examples for building an audience of fans. I’ll be referring back to this often when I need an inspirational shot in the arm.
Whew, I finished the first half of Secret Bee today and am releasing it to the world as the official trailer in a super duper blitz of promotional madness. Several other artists I know have been using Indie Go Go to promote and fund their work and I thought it might be fun to give it a try. First off, here’s the whole section for your enjoyment!
For those of you interested in some of the promotions: A Hand Drawn credit in the film, DVDs and ( The Big Kahuna! ) a numbered and framed frame of the film ( that sounds so redundant! )
Here’s one of my favorite techniques for generating sound and picture in animation; drawing on the optical track of a film. This is a technique pioneered by National Film Board artist Norman McLaren in the 50s. Using various brushes and black ink, McLaren would paint on the film soundtrack. Run through a projector, the track-heads would register the brush strokes as blips, bleeps and percussive sound.
Through experimenting with this technique he was able to calculate the pitch and speed of the various tones and “choreograph” them so that they correspond to the moving image. This clip, “Pen Point Percussion” is a good overview and shows him developing sound in this manner.
This lovely video, part of the Punto Y Raya ( dot and line ) festival archive shows kids at work creating an abstract animated piece. Long benches, paints and a continuous roll of paper with kids taking different sections. Everything comes together in a cascade of color and sound, fabulous!
